"You may know a person's face but not his heart" is a proverb that tells us to choose friends cautiously. Given that technology creates more convenient communication than before, it shrinks the time spent in connection and also breaks the limits of distance. Nowadays, even if there is a long distance between people, they can still communicate immediately. However, a problem also comes with highly developed communication. Human behaviors become more complicated, which confuses people on whether the speaker is sincere or hypocritical. People gradually get used to keeping some words without saying them, pretending to be another person, and masking themselves with a permanent "smile," eventually becoming hypocritical. To understand hypocrites, we should know how they got that way, why they continue to be that way, and why they are like liars.
A hypocrite is the product of social development. If there is only one person in the world, he would definitely not be a hypocrite because he doesn't need to care about any judgement. If there are two people in the word, the condition changes as they may interact as friends or enemies. However, both types require some communicative skills, like cooperating or negotiating. As a result, they must hide some information and may pretend to be friendly or have some advantages to make interactions go smoothly. Furthermore, if we extend the condition to the real world, which is comprised of numerous communities, people would be more likely to have more reasons to be hypocritical. Therefore, from the aforementioned, we can infer that hypocrites are people whose behaviors may contradict their personalities in order to socialize in the community.
The motives of hypocrites are based on benefits: what they can profit from and how to prevent a loss of those benefits. First of all, being a hypocrite can bring benefits because of their reputation. A good reputation makes celebrities more popular and gives them the ability to influence the public. In addition, media companies earn money by the number of listeners, readers, or viewers. As a result, talent agencies that create idols have developed since people have been using media more often. Nonetheless, do those stars behave genuinely? Actually their appearance and performance are designed to interest the audience, and advertising is the benefit they expect. Secondly, sometimes people present themselves hypocritically in order to maintain their benefits. One of my professors told me that humans, psychologically, also have a herd mentality that follows the direction of its community because it's more difficult to survive on one's own. Thus, even if people do not agree with a collective decision, they still pretend to comply with it. A well-known instance in Asia relies on Confucianism. If your superiors or colleagues invite you to a business lunch or dinner, you cannot refuse. Once you reject them, it also means that you are not one of them, and you will have less chance to be promoted.
A hypocrite is the personification of a lie. A good example is marriage. When people fall in love, they likely are hypocrites. From many divorce cases, most of them did not actually understand their lover's personality until one day when they feel something is different or they are not as loved as much as they were as the very beginning. Nevertheless, is it true? There is always no truth but a lie since everyone wants to be successful when they are going after someone. In fact, not only lovers but also they never change because they just disguise some of their true personalities and defects. Then, only after marriage or when they have been together longer, they will find the truth. Another example is politicians. Candidates always give the public a positive image when elections are coming. Also they usually tell lies about how their perfect policies can benefit people and improve the country. However, after they are elected, most of them are busy with accumulating their wealth and preparing for the next "harvest." So they still need to wear the good politician mask and tell more lies. The more beautiful lies they tell, the more votes they earn.
Almost all people are hypocrites. If you ask people whether they are hypocritical, the answer must be no because they are hiding their mendacious face. Today, perhaps to socialize or to benefit ourselves, we have many reasons to become hypocritical. People only show their good, their strength, and their false advantages to attract others. Therefore, we should open our eyes to scrutinize every relationship and never forget that "appearances always deceive."
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